“Driven” by Nick Hamm was chosen to close the 75th Venice Film Festival with Lee Pace, Judy Greer and Jason Sudeikis, which was also presented among the Special Presentations at the Toronto International Film Festival.
The movie is about the story of a drug dealer and his relationship with John DeLorean, the great Ulsterman businessman who gained recognition thanks to his cars. The screenwriter of “Driven” is Colin Bateman, already collaborator of Hamm for “The Journey,” which was presented in Venice in 2016.
Colin Bateman is born a novelist, with tens of books under his belt and mostly famous in the United Kingdom. In the recent years, he has grown an interest in the cinematographic world, using his own skills as a writer to create inspired-by-true-events fiction stories.
We talked with him about his modus operandi and the differences between movie and novel, biopic and fiction, also leaving us an interesting doubt right at the end…
_____________
How did “Driven” come to life?
_____________
I pitched the idea of “Driven” to “The Journey” producer Piers Tempest at the wrap party for “The Journey” in a Belfast hotel. So, there may have been alcohol involved. John DeLorean is only really remembered in the wider world for the car with his name in “Back to the Future” but, in Northern Ireland, he remains an extremely well-known figure – infamous in fact.
The DeLorean car was built here and provided much-needed employment during “The Troubles” – people have been trying to tell the story of his downfall for thirty years and he remains very much alive in books and documentaries and sometimes you see entire fleets of his car cruising the streets here.
_____________
It’s the second film with director Nick Hamm, had something changed in the way of making the film compared to “The Journey”?
_____________
“The Journey” for the most part was two old men arguing in the back of a car – very intimate. “Driven” is a much bigger, more ambitious, much more of a big screen experience.
Hopefully, we’re getting better with each film!
_____________
In both movies, “The Journey” and “Driven” there are strong biographical traits, where this connection to true events come from?
_____________
I’m probably still best known in the UK and Ireland as a crime novelist, so it was surprising to be offered “The Journey” in the first place.
But I loved doing it. And the thing about history and biography is that people don’t always agree what the truth actually is – there are multiple versions of it. And nobody really knows what goes on behind closed doors. So, my job is to take the bare facts of something and then say, ‘What if it really happened like this?’
_____________
Which story or book you would love to adapt on a screenplay?
_____________
One of my own novels! There’s more than thirty of them – my phone number is…
_____________
What would you like to ask John DeLorean if you could?
_____________
Did you enjoy the movie? And I’d have a taxi waiting outside in case he didn’t….
_____________
Ever you ever thought about writing a “pure” biopic?
_____________
I honestly don’t think there is any such thing – they are all essentially works of fiction. You’re trying to squeeze in events that played out over months, years or decades into a two-hour movie – it just can’t be done without invention, without creating dialogue and scenarios which might not actually have happened, but which convey the essence of what did.
“Creating dialogue and scenarios
which convey the essence of what happened.”
_____________
What do you usually miss the most about a film when writing a novel and vice versa?
_____________
Screenplays are written in a kind of shorthand, so that makes it much harder to go back and write a novel. That said, it has been three years since I last wrote one – I’m enjoying exploring the movie world and seeing what other opportunities are out there. I’m a big movie buff!
_____________
What’s your favorite “Back to the Future” movie? Which is the first memory that comes to mind if you think about these movies?
_____________
The first one is almost a perfect movie, and I think even back then I desperately wanted to be a writer, so it probably excited and depressed me at the same time to see something made so well. Strangely, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the other two movies of the series.
_____________
Favorite car of all time?
_____________
I’m not really a car person! If my car gets a flat tire I have to sell it, because I’ve no idea how to change one.
_____________
The perfect road trip you would like to take?
_____________
I don’t think it’s the road – it’s who you`re with.
_____________
What’s next for Colin?
_____________
Well, I’ve never been as busy, which is great – I’m developing a couple of other movies which are again based on real events, one of them with Nick Hamm.
And of course,
